The curious case of John Burke

Our opinion: If there’s nothing wrong with a retired police office who gets a public job while collecting a pension and then moves out of state while claiming disability, and Albany County may or may not be able to do anything about it, well, then, there ought to be.

We can’t say just yet whether what Albany County Sheriff’s Inspector John Burke is doing is legal or not. We are sure, though, that his situation is making a mockery out of not one system, but two.

There’s the system that allows governments to hire retirees like Mr. Burke and let them double dip, but apparently makes ending these cozy arrangements quite difficult — even if the employee is unqualified for the job. And there’s the system that was designed to take care of police who are hurt in the line of duty, but which has been corrupted time and again by some cops who use it as a golden parachute.

If there’s a line that’s been crossed here, Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple, County Executive Dan McCoy and District Attorney David Soares need to take appropriate action. If there isn’t a line, state lawmakers need to draw it.

As things stand now, Mr. Burke, 62, draws a roughly $90,000 county salary plus the $32,035 pension he gets as a retired Albany police officer. He lives 1,200 miles away in the Sunshine State, and doesn’t come to work.

The essential backstory here is this: Normally, retired public servants can’t collect their pension if they go back to work for a public employer. But when the sheriff’s department hired Mr. Burke 20 years ago to head up its drug unit, the county obtained a waiver from the state under a law that allows retirees to collect a salary and a pension under certain conditions.

Those conditions include being “qualified, competent and physically fit” and “an urgent need for his or her services as a result of an unplanned, unpredictable, unexpected vacancy and sufficient time is not available to recruit a qualified individual and that such hiring shall be deemed as non-permanent rather than a final filling of such position; or the prospective employer has undertaken extensive recruitment efforts and has determined that there are no available, qualified non-retirees.”

So which is it? Has Albany County had an “unexpected, unpredictable, unexpected vacancy” for two decades? Or is there no unretired police officer anywhere capable of doing Mr. Burke’s job? Or, a third option: Is the system a joke, one that, to be sure, the county, and many other governments, routinely go along with?

Mr. Burke stopped working in March, shortly after he claims to have injured himself using a battering ram to break down a door — the wrong door, as it turned out, in a situation with no apparent danger or urgency (a misdemeanor prostitution arrest, which seems to have been outside his job description, anyway).

Since then, Mr. Burke has sold his house in Albany and moved to Florida, where he’s living near Orlando. He claims that he’s disabled, which would allow him to remain on the payroll indefinitely, even getting raises while he doesn’t work, or until he’s granted retirement on disability.

But with Mr. Burke clearly no longer “physically fit” for the job, as the law requires, the county asked the state to rescind the waiver. The state civil service system refused, saying it was a matter between the county and Mr. Burke. It’s not even clear if the county has to keep him on after his latest waiver runs out in December 2013.

Maybe Mr. Burke is doing nothing wrong in milking the system for all it’s worth; it could be all within the bounds of rules he didn’t write. That’s for the county, and possibly the state — or even a court or law — to sort out.

But if it turns out there’s nothing wrong with this, there ought to be.

just i did not need, another reason to have no respect for cops. this guy is only one of MANY who milk the system at our expense.
and on the same day that albany county proposes an 8+% property tax increase. how dare they?
take a look at public safety costs in the county…and reign them in…

John Burke if you think this is the way to man up then you are on the drugs you were supposed to keep off the streets.You should be ashamed of yourself.You must not have any self respect.Albany County gave you waivers for 20 years and you should have built a nice nest egg.What is wrong with you?Having trust and faith in people gets harder everyday.